Writing and Publishing Your Research

Today, there are thousands of students enrolled in one form of higher degree or another around the world. There is no doubt that these students are engaged in very essential work, contributing new findings that have enabled various countries to develop. It can be said, with some element of certainty, that research is largely driven by higher degree students or fresh graduates, especially postdoctoral researchers. These Graduates turn out a large number of theses or reports every year. Sadly, some of those reports only end on library shelves or electronic repositories at the graduate school. The information is lost to users as they are not published and more widely disseminated. The world would gain more from the research of higher degree students if more of the findings are published in journals or presented at conferences. The publication of research findings by this class of researchers is greatly hampered by lack of knowledge or courage to prepare and send their manuscripts to journals. In many instances the curriculum of the higher degree programme does not include teaching of publication skills. Where this is available, the period of candidature is getting too short, with the result that students do not have the time to participate in such extra activities.